3 types of startups helping you fight energy waste and save money

We all hate spending money on utilities. I highlight companies and other initiatives working to save renters money on energy — by providing portable, cheaper tools, new financing tools to afford expensive retrofits, or new sources of green energy cheaper than your utility. As renters, we should be aware and support these efforts.

According to a survey by Freddie Mac, more renters are worried about rising utility bills (70%) than rising rents (63%).

Most solutions are impractical or too expensive for renters and landlords

Renters are 30% — 40% less likely than homeowners to be energy efficient. Solar panels or insulation retrofits are (1) too annoying or impossible to move to your next apartment or (2) too expensive with large up-front costs. Landlords — who own the building — otherwise do not care about saving you money since you pay for your own utilities. This gap between renters’ and landlords’ interests is called the “split incentives problem.” So you — the renter — use what’s there: Drafty windows and earth-killing appliances your landlord hasn’t updated since the 1980s.

Unfortunately, these cost-saving solutions are too expensive or impractical for most renters, especially if they can’t take those improvements with them to their next apartment. Fortunately, startups and other initiatives are starting to address these problems.

Meet the startups fighting energy waste

Strategy #1: Affordable and portable tools for renters

To address the fact that some tools are too cumbersome or impossible to move to your next apartment, a swath of portable energy-saving or energy-producing tools have come onto the market.

Smart Thermometers. A $250 Nest can result in savings of 10–15% of your heating and cooling costs, with a payback period, as one analyst estimates, of 1.5 years by saving $120/year. These are small and easy enough to install and reinstall as you move to different apartments. Heat Seek produces a smart thermometer that collects hourly temperature data to advocate for tenants who suffer from a lack of heat.

Energy monitors. The Sense Home Energy Monitor connects to your home’s electrical panel and provides insight into your energy usage. Neurio, which is a monitor for solar energy, claims to reduce your payback period for solar by 30%. Ohm Connect pays you money to cut back on electricity when there is high demand for it in your area. Residents, according to the FAQs, can make $100-$300 a year.

Sense Home Energy Monitor tells you where you’re wasting the most energy

Energy audits. For $200-$400 or even for free, local technicians measure airflow and detect sources of drafts in your house. Using this information, you can use targeted insulation to save money on heating and cooling costs. One person documents that he spent $400 on the audit and $500 on insulation and labor costs to save $1000 a year, resulting in a one-year payback. Search the residential energy services network’s database to find an energy auditor near you, but confirm they’ve passed muster by searching their business in the Better Business Bureau database. Furthermore, check to see whether your electric or gas provider will give you a rebate to install insulation as a result of your audit. One person found his provider gave a 75% rebate for these items.

Energy auditors come to your home and find sources of drafts and energy loss using data like the above.

Smart Radiator Covers. By wrapping a $250 Cozy over your radiator, you can control your room’s heat better. No longer do you have to open your windows in the dead of winter. Plus, a Cozy is digitally monitored. So when they’re placed throughout a building, data is fed back to boilers to redistribute heat. Increases in energy efficiency result in a payback of two years.

On-bill financing.Matter.solar and Ouachita Energy Cooperative (in Arkansas) are initiatives that pay for energy-efficiency or solar retrofits upfront (or help you find lenders). The energy savings over decades pays for the upfront costs plus interest, resulting in minimal or new increases in the renter’s utility bill. This financing tool is called “on-bill financing.” If a tenant moves out before the payback period, the obligation can be transferred to the new tenant, since the improvements stay with the physical structure. Similarly, Sealed targets homeowners and has plans to work with renters in the future.

People and other smaller investors — not banks or big investors — lend you capital to finance your project.

Barnraising. While this solution still requires you to get consent from your landlord, Grid Alternatives provide free or low-cost panels to low-income families in exchange for allowing community volunteers and job trainees to get hands-on experience (“barnraising”) to install those panels. Because this model is free for the renter and landlord, landlords can’t complain about the cost and there are no obligations to payback.

This strategy minimizes both aspects of the split-incentives problem. Tenure isn’t an issue. Renters can buy cheaper, renewable energy sources regardless of where they live. Upfront costs aren’t an issue. Third parties build and maintain these farms. Lastly, landlord consent isn’t an issue. Local solar farms sidestep any need to install solar on your roof; a requirement that blocked up to 92% of US residents from using solar energy.

“Smart” energy retailers.Drift, which is available for NYC residents, buys, trades, and sells energy from multiple suppliers using machine learning algorithms to optimize for price. They estimate cost savings of 10%-20%.

Solar farms. Solstice, Renovus, and Arcadia Power build solar gardens into which renters can lease solar panels for little or no upfront cost using on-bill financing. Renovus in New York and Nexamp in Massachusetts, for instance, allows renters to purchase energy with no upfront cost that is 10% — 15% cheaper than market rate. Cost savings from solar-produced energy not only pay for the lease but also result in credits to your utility bill. Energysage has a database you can use to find a community solar project near you.

Batteries that store extra energy. With nightfall, solar panels can no longer generate electricity, forcing homes to rely on the grid. But with batteries, solar can store extra energy produced by microgrids and solar farms throughout the day. A $14,000 battery can take 8–12 years to pay back. While targeted towards homeowners, Swell can benefit renters by increasing the efficiency of solar farms and microgrids who sell energy to renters.

Ideally, we’d live in a society where policies would incentivize developers, landlords, or renters to build or retrofit green. See, for instance, Germany’s recent bill to help renter access solar on their apartments. But until then, to save money on your utility bill, it’s going to take some work. These products can be good investments in the long-term, paying itself off and saving you money over the decades.

If you’ve used any of these products or services, I’d love to hear your experiences.